


hang on to your hopes, my friend (1/1)

by la_victorienne



Category: Torchwood
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-01-29
Updated: 2009-01-29
Packaged: 2018-10-16 01:00:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 558
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10560718
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/la_victorienne/pseuds/la_victorienne
Summary: weevil hunting.  something goes wrong.





	

The Weevil is strong, stronger than Jack anticipated, and there’s something awful in its eyes. He lunges for it, but it sweeps him aside with a single blow and goes for Ianto, who is holding up the spray as if it will save him. Jack watches, unable to move, as Ianto is cut down as roughly as he was before and the Weevil goes for his neck, brutal teeth bared. Jack’s heart stops.

 

 

 

Later, Ianto is in the med bay and Gwen is patching up his wound, a jagged claw gash from one shoulder all the way down to the other hip – long, but both thin and shallow, thank god. He doesn’t seem to need stitches, Gwen is saying, just an alien sealant Owen deemed safe months before he died, a lot of gauze wrapped around him, and a changing later in the night. They need a medic, Gwen is saying, but that’s an argument for another time because all Jack wants to do is get Ianto home and to bed, because the painkillers are making him drowsy and delirious. Gwen presses the emergency bag into Jack’s fingers and tries in vain to meet his eyes. “Take care of him,” she is saying.

Oh, he will, he thinks. He’s heartsick and terrified, and he can’t stop his own heart from racing even as Ianto’s breath slows into rhythm. He can’t believe how close they came to something Jack can hardly imagine – it’s more than another man down, it’s half of Jack’s heart – and he keeps reaching over through the drive, touching Ianto’s leg, making sure he’s still there, alive, breathing. Jack can’t even imagine what he’d do if Ianto weren’t next to him. He loves Gwen, yes, and he’s so glad she’s a part of who he is and will always be, but she is not and will never be his lover.

And does it surprise him, that he’s formed an attachment despite careful instructions to himself not to? He aches with the thought of letting Ianto go, but he would not give up the deep and resonating feeling that forces this kind of need, desire, adoration. And he’s all the more aware that Ianto is here beside him, and he’s more turned on than he’s ever remembered, but only in the way he vaguely remembers from puberty, aroused by proximity and too tongue-tied to do anything. And when they stop in the parking garage to Ianto’s flat, and Ianto lifts his eyelids and regards him groggily, with heavy-handed gratitude, Jack can’t help but lean over the bulky console and kiss Ianto on the mouth, a kiss that, unlike almost all of their previous, has no other purpose but to be a kiss. Almost as if they’re courting.

Ianto’s hand rises weakly to Jack’s jaw, holding him in place, enjoying the simplicity of the connection. Just another reminder that he’s here.

Jack can’t carry him all the way up to the flat, but he does take one of Ianto’s arms over his shoulder, and when he lays Ianto in the bed and covers him with the sheet, he murmurs the promise not to leave against Ianto’s skin. True to his word, he sits in the chair by the bed, watching Ianto’s chest rise and fall, expression inscrutable, heart smouldering. He won’t ever take Ianto Jones for granted again.


End file.
